Someone On The Outside Needs To Tell You…

It usually has to come from somebody on the outside looking in. They are on your side, in your corner and observing what is happening in your life.  They have listened to you in a single conversation when you poured out your heart, or they lent an ear over an extended period during which you have shared some of the challenges you are facing. Like the person in the pool cannot feel wet, you are in the middle of something troubling, so you cannot perfectly discern what is happening with you in the moment.  You need an independent observer. You need a neutral party to help you work through what is happening. You risk it by opening up to this person and then, as an outsider looking in, he or she says to you calmly, “The challenges you are facing, the weight that you feel, the helplessness that you are wrestling with is not the work of your enemy.  God is allowing these things. Friend, the Father is pruning you right now.”

“Every branch of mine that does not bear fruit He takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit He prunes, that it may bear more fruit.” – Jesus, in John 15:2

When a Christian is in the midst of a prolonged season of challenge, it is uncommon for him or her to immediately recognize that the Father has determined a time of pruning for them. We usually try to work ourselves out of our jams.  We are skilled pressure-lesseners. We maneuver, we dart, we dodge, we recalibrate. In times wherein God is not determining to prune us, these responses to challenges can be valid. Yet, when the loving Father has His shears in His hand, Jesus taught us that all our movements will be futile to escape the short season of our discomfort.  Jesus gives one command to those who are being pruned by the Father: abide in Me.

The Savior taught us that we bring glory to the Father by living increasingly fruitful lives (John 15:8). Fruitless Christians are contradictions in terms. As a matter of fact, Jesus taught us that those who do not bear fruit are actually removed and destroyed (John 15:2, 6). Therefore, it is in the very nature of the Christian to bring forth spiritual produce from his or her life. What is Jesus talking about when He mentions our fruit? Broadly, this fruit is simply the outflow of the Kingdom from our lives. Fruit may grow slowly, and fruit is measured over time but, at some point, fruit becomes visible. Different branches bear different amounts but, ultimately, every true believer will bear fruit.  Yet this process of pruning is necessary because, at various points, the Father determines that we are ready to bear even more fruit. In the agricultural world, the farmer will literally use his or her expertise to cut a branch that has been previously fruitful. He or she brings out the pruning shears, notes where to make the cut on the branch, applies pressure that brings the blades against that branch and –snip! – he or she takes a portion away. It sounds counterintuitive to take something away in order to bring something forth but, apart from pruning the branches, there will never be a greater amount of produce than there has been before. The farmer has said yes to pruning but, if the branch could speak, it would likely say, “Please, not today. Not now! Not ever!”

So, some of you need an outside voice today that reassures you that you are in the Father’s will as you are feeling the slicing of the shears, the pressure of the His hands, and the sense of loss as He takes away a portion of what once brought forth produce from your life. In times of pruning, we typically sense what is being lost, not what is coming as gain. It feels like a take-away, but in actuality, it is a pruning process which will soon result in an increase. Jesus taught that pruning results in more fruit, which results in greater glory for the Father. Others are also going to be able to eat from the increase of fullness that comes forth your post-pruning growth – the Father wants to make you a greater blessing to others.  I do not hesitate to mention that you will also be personally blessed from the pruning. It will become your increase, your growth, your deepening and your own joy. The call upon you right now is to recognize that this uncomfortable season is from the Father – and that He does it to every single Christian who has been previously fruitful. This discomfort is actually evidence of His affirmation of how you have been abiding and producing.  He is saying that it is the time for your increase which He has determined for your life, therefore it must first become a season of less for you. There is no mistaking that pruning is painful on some level. I cannot truthfully declare that I love to be pruned by the Father. I should confess that there have been times when I knew that He was pruning me and, because I did not feel up to the struggle, I requested that He let me live in the land of lesser-fruit instead. I appreciate pruning, I do not enjoy pruning…but I need it.

And so do you.

In the midst of it, the learning moment comes when we have to decide if we will trust the hands which hold the shears. We must conclude whether or not we believe that His heart is kind. We must answer the challenge of whether or not we are confident that He knows what He is doing with us. Pruning, at its core, is relational. There is a Father and a child. There is a gardener and a branch. There is produce and a price. And the Father has determined that you are ready for it.

He trusts us with His pruning process, so can we now trust Him?